The Queen's Gambit, novel by Walter Tevis, internet series by Scott Frank

 She had heard of the genetic code that could shape an eye or hand from passing proteins.  Deoxyribbonucleic Acid.  It contained the entire set of instructions for constructing a respiratory system and a digestive one, as well as the grip of an infant's hand.  Chess was like that.  The geometry of a position could be read and reread and not exhausted of possibility.  You saw deeply into this layer of it, but there was another layer beyond that, and another.

Walter Devis, The Queen's Gambit (Random House, 1983)         

The queen's gambit is an opening in chess where white offers black the chance to capture a pawn; whether or not black accepts determines what may happen next.  Perhaps Tevis meant Beth Harmon, the main protagonist of his novel, to represent the queen.  The novel sees Harmon from the inside, in the sense we get details of what she is thinking as she plays her games, from the orphanage where she learns the game from the janitor to her eventual world championship.  Scott Frank sees Harmon more from the outside, played beutifully and intelligently by Anya Taylor-Joy.  Frank takes full advantage of the relatively new way of adapting novels, i.e., as an internet series, in this case seven episodes totaling over six hours of screentime, including almost everything in the novel (which takes about the same amount of time to read).  My problem with the internet series is that it doesn't give us the details of Harmon's matches to the extent that Tevis does, presumably because much of the audience would not have patience for that.  My own relationship with chess has been off and on.  I learned it from a neighbor when I was very young and eventually played it with my son Gideon, who was somewhat passionate about it for a time, but neither of us made the effort to go into the details and history of the game.  I think when I was younger I was attracted to the geometric beauties of the game but soon realized the psychological pressure of a game where there is no chance involved and one mistake can cause one to lose the game.  Perhaps this is one of the reasons some chess champions go mad (or may have been partly mad to begin with).

I recommend Scott Frank's series if one is interested in the personalities and social aspects of being a successful championship chess player.  If one is more interested in the history, strategies and details of the competitive game I would recommend Tevis's intense novel.